


Peanut Butter

by jennagrins



Category: Darkest Powers - Kelley Armstrong
Genre: F/M, Fluff and Humor, Mutual Pining, Unresolved Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-23
Updated: 2017-11-23
Packaged: 2019-02-05 08:57:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,597
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12791157
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jennagrins/pseuds/jennagrins
Summary: Derek really likes peanut butter.  Chloe wishes he liked her half that much.





	Peanut Butter

Chloe sits on the couch, studiously avoiding the reading she should be doing. She looks over at Derek, who is concentrating on his textbook. He never has any issues studying. He never has any issue doing anything he puts his mind to. He is always so focused and determined. Unlike her.

Like last night when she'd been trying to summon and had accidentally raised every animal carcass within a 5 mile radius. He had stayed calm, even when she'd been seriously panicking. He'd grabbed her arms so she couldn't see the dead bodies dragging themselves towards her.

"You need to release them," he'd said, voice strained.

"I'm trying."

"Keep trying."

But he hadn't yelled. Even afterwards, when she could tell he'd wanted to. He'd started to ask her what she thought she was doing but then she'd looked at him and he'd stopped himself. He still told her she needed to be more careful in a bit of a growl and then said he was glad she was okay.

That was a lot coming from Derek.

It's hard sometimes, liking someone that isn't expressive at all. Someone who doesn't like you the way you like them. She knows she should be happy with the slow progress of their friendship. He trusts her — she knows that's rare. He looks out for her. He's always there when she needs him. He'd even bit back the lecture she knows he'd wanted to give her, which was so very un-Derek like and yet he'd done it for her. She appreciates all of that. And yet.

And yet she can't help but fantasize about what yesterday could have been. The scene was set perfectly. Boy. Girl. Dark, dangerous forest. The girl surrounded by the dead bodies of the animals she'd accidentally raised from the dead.

After weeks on the run, it would be the perfect time for an emotional climax. She imagines it as a movie she's directing.

Derek would crash through the woods. Shirtless. He'd see her and take her into his arms, saying "Just look at me. You're okay. Just focus on me and then release their spirits." His voice would be soft and deep. No rushing, just understanding and patient and there for her.

When she'd finally succeeded and whispered "it's done," he'd pull her desperately against his bare chest, tell her "God, Chloe. You scared me."

"I'm sorry," she'd whisper into his chest, feeling safe finally. "I didn't mean to."

And then he'd pull back to get a good look at her, and she'd stare up into his eyes and he'd look down at her and he wouldn't be able to help himself. He'd lean down and his lips would brush against hers and—

She can't help looking over at Derek, blushing furiously and jerking her face back down when her eyes meet his. What if he knows what she's been thinking about? _He's a werewolf, not a mind-reader_ , she tells herself, impatient with her embarrassment. There's no way he knows that she was just fantasizing about him.

A tiny doubt creeps in, however, as he comes over and sits next to her.

"Chloe..." he begins and she jerks her eyes up to his. He trails off, breathing in deeply and then he's leaning in towards her and her thoughts are a flurry. _Oh my god did he read my mind? Is he going to kiss me? Ohmygodhe'sgoingtokissme!_

He stops as suddenly as he started, their faces mere inches apart.

_Please, please, please_ , she thinks and can't help the tiny noise that escapes her.

He doesn't kiss her. Instead he jerks back, stands and leaves the room abruptly.

She remains, blinking in confusion and too stunned to move, for several minutes. What just happened?

* * *

_You're not an animal_ , Derek tells himself viciously, pacing where he's barricaded himself in his bedroom. _You can't just act on instinct like that. You need to think! Think about the fact that Chloe doesn't like you like that._

He can't believe he lost control of himself like that. He knows better.

And he certainly knows better than to make moves on cute girls who apparently even _Simon_ isn't good enough for.

He had been trying to read about Euclidian space, but it was a little hard to understand how it applied to vectors when he kept feeling Chloe's eyes on him. She's always distracted him — he can't help that part of him is always aware of her. But he'd never seen that look on her face before and he couldn't imagine what it meant. And then she jerked and looked away, cheeks pink.

He'd caught himself smiling before he realized it and tried to return to his book, but Chloe's heartbeat distracted him.

_Thumpthumpthumpthumpthump-_

He knew she was probably still freaked out from raising half the damn forest the day before. So he set his textbook down and went to her.

He'd been thinking about making her feel better. He'd been thinking that he wouldn't get any work done until she'd worked through what had happened yesterday and calmed down. He'd been thinking he could be her friend.

Now he's thinking he's an idiot.

"Chloe..." he'd begun, intending to follow with words of reassurance.

But that close to her, he couldn't get past her name, overwhelmed as the smell of her filled his nostrils, stronger than he had ever smelled her before. He had breathed in deeply. Honey and vanilla and something else, something more, something all Chloe and absolutely intoxicating. A smell that commanded him to do things. He had been half-crazy with it.

_Mine_ , the wolf in him had growled, and he found himself leaning in toward her, leaning in to claim what he wanted, what was _his_.

Then she'd made that small, scared sound and it was like being doused in cold water.

He had been about to kiss her. God, he really is out of his mind. He had been about to _kiss_ her.

His eyes had flashed from her lips to her eyes. And then he'd taken her in: wide eyes, shallow breathing, accelerated heart rate.

And he'd gotten out of there as fast as he could.

He knows that most people find him intimidating and even downright scary, but the idea that Chloe — _brave_ Chloe, who didn't even look afraid when he was Changing — that _Chloe_ would be afraid of him! But what did he expect, lunging at her like some kind of wild animal?

He sighs, frustrated with himself. He wants to blame it on the wolf, but those impulses...they came from him. And somehow that's even worse because he's supposed to be in control.

Chloe...she's important to him. He trusts her, trusts her in the same way that he trusts Dad and Simon. More, in a way. It hadn't been Simon that had gotten off the bus with him to help him through the unsuccessful Change at that truck stop. When he's Changing, she's the only one he wants around. She's his friend, and he's not someone who has friends. And somehow she's kind-hearted enough to care about him too. He's not stupid, he knows that much.

But she's never going to like him the way he likes her. Really, he's not stupid.

The knock at the door actually manages to catch him by surprise and he curses himself for letting his thoughts absorb him so completely that he missed the sounds of her footsteps.

He barely has a moment to think of trying to escape — maybe the window? — when Chloe opens the door and then she's standing there, filling his room with her scent, while blood rushes violently in his ears.

"So…what happened back there?" she asks, closing the door behind her.

He shrugs without answering. What's he supposed to say?

"D-d-derek—" Chloe breaks off and takes a deep breath. He can hear her racing heart, which would make clear that she's nervous even if her stutter didn't, but her gaze on him is surprisingly steady. She starts again, slower this time. "W-were you – I-I mean – were you about to k-k-k-kiss me back there?"

He can feel the blood rushing to his face. The last thing he wants to hear from her right now is that she doesn't like him like that. He knows, he doesn't have to hear her say the words. Chloe is clearly holding out for someone amazing and good for her that she isn't willing to settle. But is it so horrible that he doesn't want to hear that being with him would be settling? At the very least it would make things awkward between them. It would hurt to see her uncomfortable and tense around him. And she probably wouldn't want to come with him when he Changes anymore. Well of course she wouldn't — he does that naked! And while he doubts she's so much as given him a glance, it will change things, won't it, if she realizes how he feels about her?

The whole situation seems profoundly unfair. He lets his grip on his feelings slip for one second and now their friendship is going to be strained. And he didn't even get to kiss her first!

Then again...he hasn't actually kissed her. Maybe he can still salvage this.

"Derek?" she prompts him.

"I think I misheard you. It sounded like you asked if I tried to kiss you," he says.

"Didn't you?"

"Try to kiss you? Why would I do that?" he asks. _I mean, aside from the fact that you're beautiful and smell so enticing and— NOT the time, Souza! Focus!_ He swallows uncomfortably.

"I...don't know," she says and averts her eyes. "So, um, what were you doing then?"

"Peanut butter," he blurts.

"Peanut butter," she echoes, sounding unconvinced.

"On your breath," he says. He's never been more grateful for his ability to come up with things on the fly. "I could smell it from across the room." He shrugs in a carefully casual way. "I really love peanut butter. I haven't had any since before Lyle House — they didn't keep any because of allergy concerns, they said. I didn't even know we had any here."

She stares at him but he can't make out her expression. So he just keeps his breathing even and his expression neutral, while he waits for her to respond. Waits to find out if he is safe, if she believes him, if they are okay.

She laughs nervously. "Okay, that's awkward," she says. "I didn't know you were so into peanut butter. I can show you where it is?"

"That would be amazing," he says as relief floods him.

He follows her downstairs to the kitchen where she shows him the peanut butter tucked away at the back of the pantry. She watches him make a peanut butter sandwich, and then she watches as he scarfs it down past the tightness in his throat and the nerves in his stomach, smiling around the bites like it's the best thing in the world. Like it's his cravings for _peanut butter_ that had him ready to inhale her.

When he's finished, she smiles easily at him, and walks away.

He's saved.

* * *

Chloe is still thinking about the peanut butter incident the next day at lunch. She knows she should stop, but she can't keep from replaying that moment over and over in her mind. The moment when Derek leaned in like he was going to kiss her. She knows that's not what was happening...but still. The look in his green eyes as they'd fixed on her, deliciously dark... she'd felt that all the way down.

She shivers. She wants him to look at her like that again.

It sucked to discover that the lust in his eyes had all been for the peanut butter on her breath.

What she wouldn't give for him to be _half_ as into her as he is into peanut butter!

As she rummages in the pantry, her eyes catch on the peanut butter. She knows it's not the same as him actually being interested in her, but it occurs to her that she can get him to look at her like that again...

She grabs the peanut butter. That look is going to be all hers.

Well, hers and peanut butter's.

* * *

He is watching a movie with Simon the following night, something about cars that are really giant robots. He isn't paying too much attention to the plot, just glancing up from time to time to catch one of the action scenes, and then turning back to the reading he'd abandoned yesterday because of Chloe.

And speak of the devil… in walks Chloe with Tori.

"Mind if we join you guys?" she asks. Tori rolls her eyes.

"Sure," Simon says.

The girls join Simon on the couch.

It is one of the scenes where the giant car-robots aren't fighting each other so he turns his attention back to his textbook. Or at least, he tries to. He is finding it difficult to concentrate. Something is niggling at his senses. Whatever it is, it's distracting.

And then he identifies the cause of his distraction. Wafting towards him is the subtle yet distinctive smell of peanut butter.

He looks at Chloe. She appears to be absorbed in the movie.

He shakes his head to clear it. So Chloe ate peanut butter. Again. So what?

He looks down at the text and tries to focus on the smell of old book instead.

It doesn't work.

* * *

The next morning, Chloe makes peanut butter toast for breakfast. After yesterday's failure, one thing is clear: she needs more peanut butter.

So this time she slathers the peanut butter on so thick her mouth keeps sticking shut as she tries to chew.

This time it has to work.

When she finishes eating, she goes and looks for Derek. She finds him in his room.

"Hey," she says brightly, standing as close to him as she thinks she can reasonably get away with. "I wanted to try summoning again, but I figured it wasn't a good idea to go alone. Did you want to come with me?"

He nods. "Let's go."

And that's how she ends up spending the entire morning out in the woods, trying to call different spirits while Derek sits nearby, watching her carefully.

He doesn't look at her with those peanut butter lust eyes once.

Maybe now that he's had peanut butter, its pull on him isn't as strong.

Or maybe she just needs more peanut butter.

* * *

The day after that Derek catches her standing in the kitchen eating peanut butter directly out of the jar with a spoon.

He stares at her.

"What?" she says, the picture of innocence. "You're the only one who's allowed to like peanut butter?"

He is starting to wonder if he is being toyed with. Before he's thought it through, he takes the spoon from her hand, scoops a giant spoonful of peanut butter out of the jar and shovels it into his mouth.

The spoon tastes like _Chloe_ , he realizes, as want fists in his belly.

In a daze, he hands her back her spoon and walks out of there before he does something stupid. More stupid.

_You're not an animal_ , he tells himself.

The wolf inside of him just growls in satisfaction.

* * *

The next day finds Chloe scraping the last of the peanut butter onto a piece of toast. She stares down into the empty jar sadly. There's not even enough to cover the whole piece.

_Crap_.

She can see Derek through the kitchen window. Pretty soon he'll be back from his run and _she is out of peanut butter_!

She needs a new plan, she thinks, as she munches on the toast. This meagre amount of peanut butter will never do.

Watching him, she tries not to stare at the way the sweat makes his baggy t-shirt stick to his skin, reminding her of the muscular, manly body underneath that shirt.  She watches as he pulls his t-shirt over his head and uses it to wipe the sweat from his face and neck. The broad planes of his chest, the generous curves of his biceps, the hard muscles of his abdomen… She can't tear her eyes away. Her mouth gets incredibly wet at the sight.

He is pulling his shirt back down as he comes through the door, but stops when he sees her. His cheeks redden in anger and his eyes widen with betrayal when he catches sight of her with his beloved peanut butter.

The deep breath he takes seems to tell her: _You are eating all of my peanut butter and I am very upset, but I am taking calming breaths so that I don't kill you with my werewolf prowess._

Well, if this is going to be her last chance, she might as well make the most of it.

She lifts the hand with the remains of her toast and says, "Sorry! I'm afraid this is the last of it."

"You don't sound very sorry," he observes.

"Well there isn't much I can do about it now. This is all that's left," she says. She thinks of offering him that last piece. Maybe she could even get away with "playfully" shoving it in his mouth. Maybe then he'd look at her with those peanut butter lust eyes up close. She wonders what it would be like for her fingers to "accidentally" graze his lips. It's tempting... But then another idea occurs to her. _Go big or go home, right?_ "Oh well," she says and jams the last bite in her mouth.

He gapes at her as she struggles to chew and swallow all of it. Why does peanut butter need to be so sticky?

He rushes out of the kitchen, giving her as large a berth as possible.

"Wait," she tries to say, but the peanut butter sticks to the roof of her mouth and it comes out more like "Wrfl."

He doesn't stop, just disappears out of the kitchen and away from her.

Peanut butter, 5.  
Chloe, 0.

Well, her attempts to join forces with peanut butter have failed miserably, but she's not giving up hope yet.

* * *

Derek lets the water run over his head, trying to wash away the fog from his mind along with the sweat from his run. It is getting harder and harder to be around Chloe. Ever since that day, she's been eating a lot of peanut butter... If he didn't know better, he would think she was flirting with him.

And then in the kitchen... He's not sure why he was so embarrassed to have her catch him so exposed like that. It's not like it's the first time and he knows — _knows_! — she's indifferent to him. And yet there'd been something in her look that had seemed to suggest... He won't let himself finish the thought. Nothing good can come of letting himself think that way. But right at that moment of vulnerability, he'd been assaulted by the scent of her, with that undercurrent of something he can't quite identify, but which threatens to drive him out of his mind with desire for her. It was just like that day when he'd almost kissed her.

He gets out of the shower and towels off, then heads to his bedroom to dress and think this through.

If he doesn't figure out a way to get a hold of himself fast, he is going to do something stupid. The house is too small to avoid her, and anyway he doesn't want to do that. If he's avoiding her, he can't protect her. And he wants her around. No, there has to be some other way to keep himself in check.

He pulls his shirt on quickly when he hears her footsteps outside of his door. When he opens his door, he sees Chloe standing there, hand poised to knock.

"Guess you heard me, huh."

"Yeah."

"I just wanted to say I'm sorry. For eating all of the peanut butter."

"It's fine," he says uncomfortably. He still hasn't decided what to do about his overwhelming attraction to her, and having her standing so close like this smelling like, like _her_ , is not helping matters!

"I was just trying to tease you a little, but you seemed pretty mad down there. I guess I took it too far."

"I'm not mad," he says automatically.

"But you wish you could have had a last taste," she suggests, stepping closer to him.

"Yes?"

She grabs the front of his shirt and pulls him down towards her. He's normally really quick, but he has no idea what she's doing, until she says "Well if that's all" and kisses him.

At the first touch of her lips to his, he gives a little growl, and then his hands are in her hair and he's kissing Chloe. He can taste the peanut butter on her tongue, but underneath is the taste of _her_ and that's something else all together. He chases the taste of her, licking his way into her mouth. The taste of her on his tongue, the smell of her all around him — that heady smell from earlier, the one he can't resist, but even stronger now somehow — combine to send his head spinning. She's _everything_.

When they finally pull back, gasping for breath, she says, "Wow. You really like peanut butter, huh?"

He rolls his eyes. "Chloe," he says, "it's not the peanut butter."

"That's what I was hoping you'd say," she says, and kisses him again.

— **The End** —


End file.
